- Kachin Garments.
A selection of the most interesting Kachin garments and wallets has been made and their detailed descriptions follow.
- Skirts.
GK 39 (Fig. 33) is a Kachin woman's skirt made of three strips of beady terracotta coloured native cloth, varying between 22 cm. and 23 cm. (8¾ in.-9in.) in width, and being 178 cm. (5ft. 10in.) in length. The central portion of the skirt, for about two-thirds of the whole length, is striped, the colours black, blue, or terra-cotta being determined by the warp. Red is used for the weft and is almost invisible, the warp forming the surface of the cloth (Fig. 33a). Above and below these finely woven stripes is a coarser weave obtained by grouping the warp threads. The weft then comes to the surface and two patterned borders are made by the use of a black and a terra-cotta weft. A variation in tone is produced by the arrangement of the black and terra-cotta stripes in the warp (Fig. 33, b and c). A further border of brocade weaving in terra-cotta, yellow, blue, green, white and black is evidently inspired by the Chinese fret, but has the typical Kachin arrangement of three keys in a group (Fig. 33a) p. 40.
GK 39a (Figs. 34, 34a and 34b, p. 41-43). This is the finest example of a Kachin garment in the collection, and is made of three strips of terra-cotta coloured cloth 21, 22 and 23 cm. in width respectively. The length of each of these strips is 164 cm. and they are joined along their selvedges by a coarse black seaming or overhand stitching. The heavy cloth is a poplin weave having a terra-cotta warp and a black weft. There are 64 warp and 20 weft threads to the inch and they are about the same thickness. Between the borders a b c (Fig. 34) a different effect is obtained by using a double terra-cotta weft in the shuttle and taking up four warps at each pick. The coarse poplin weave thus produced has its ridges running longitudinally instead of across the cloth, the weft forming the surface.
